


C.A.L.M.

by josiechambers3



Series: 5 Seconds of Superheroes [1]
Category: 5 Seconds of Summer (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, C.A.L.M., F/M, H.A.N.D., H.E.A.D., S.T.O.R.M., superhero au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-20
Updated: 2015-11-10
Packaged: 2018-04-27 08:43:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 12,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5041684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/josiechambers3/pseuds/josiechambers3
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>C.A.L.M. down. The heroes are here.</p><p>(Also known as that one 5SOS superhero AU where Michael's an idiot, Luke has an odd tendency to speak with a Shakespearian British accent, Ashton's a bumbling, awkward dummy, and Calum is...well, Calum.)</p><p>*</p><p>(A 5SOS superhero AU. Written by josiechambers3. Edited + foreword by violentclarke.)</p><p>(The original version of this story is posted on Wattpad under the username juniortheguitar - a collab account between myself - Josie - and Vi, by the way.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. PROLOGUE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prologue. That's it, really. Just...prologue. Not even "THE prologue." Just "prologue." :P

**~ PROLOGUE ~**

****  


CALM:

C: Created for

A: All

L: Losers of

M: Mankind

That's what the public was told it stood for. But, like most of the things HEAD told them, it wasn't true.

C: Calum

A: Ashton

L: Luke

M: Michael

That's what it really stood for.

But they didn't want anyone to know that, did they?


	2. FOREWORD (by violentclarke)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Foreword written by the lovely violentclarke. Keep being awesome, Vi! :)

**~ FOREWORD ~**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

while this is on a joint account **[ josie: not on AO3, it's not ],** I want the lot of you to understand something.

I -Vi Clarke- am not writing this story.

I repeat, I am not writing this story.

I’m merely helping with brainstorming (aka the plot line), formatting, and posting.

so yes, while this is posted on our joint account, I am not a writer.

(don’t worry. the story josie and I are writing together will get posted eventually. **[ Josie: this won't be on AO3 either...that i know of. ]** )

it’s a 5sos fanfic.

involving superheroes.

and shipping.

and epic mind-fucking.

and awesomeness.

and sex jokes.

and other hilarious things.

also, josie’s writing is kickass (so that’s a plus).

so, loves.

before you click that next button, I present to you

C.A.L.M.

a 5 seconds of summer alternate universe

enjoy.


	3. ONE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter one. Calum, Luke, and Michael go to a party that may or may not be at Ashton Irwin's house.

**~ ONE ~**

**  
**

**[ C.L.M. ]**

    “Are you sure?”

    “Of course, Luke,” responded one of his best mates. “I mean, we have got to be the only freshmen invited, so of course we’re going!”

    “I agree with Mikey; gotta admit it,” inputted the only of the three with dark hair. “It’ll be fun! First party of the year—well, first ever for us—and it’s HEAD-approved, so it’ll be totally cool, but we won’t get in trouble of anything.”

    Luke hesitated.

    “Come on,” Mikey coaxed. “Think: hot older girls, Lukey!” He turned to the third friend for help. “C’mon, Cal,” he said. “Help me convince him.”

    Calum was better at persuading Luke, and Michael knew it.

    “Lucas Robert Hemmings, Ashton Irwin is holding this party. The Ashton Irwin. You know, popular, slightly geeky junior?” But Luke wasn’t buying it, so Calum sighed and increased the power of his argument with one simple sentence.

    “You might get to see his younger sister again.”

    Though he vehemently denied it, Luke did, in fact, have a minute crush on Ashton Irwin’s sister.

    Luke sighed, giving in.

    “I dunno if I like this or not, but fine, let’s go.”

**[ C.L.M. ]**

 

    Ashton Irwin’s house wasn’t far from Luke’s, so the three Aussie teens arrived there fast, as well as right on time. The three of them stood in the street, staring at the house and all the people going inside.

    Michael, Calum, and even Luke had to admit how amazed they were at the mass of people. There had to be a good twenty to thirty people outside alone. And the house was a huge two-story, thanks to Ashton’s father’s job as a scientist, so who knew how many more people were inside.

    Luke gulped slightly, making sure to hide it. He was the most socially awkward of the three, despite his typically cheery and slightly crazy personality.

    Suddenly, Michael spotted a familiar flash of black hair.

    “Calum,” he said, pointing, “isn’t that your sister?”

    Calum froze. “She said she was going on a trip with her college friends!” he said accusingly. She may have been older than Calum, but that didn’t stop her fifteen-year-old brother from caring and worrying (on occasion).

    Calum muttered a quick “excuse me” and quickly approached the girl, but something seemed off.

    She was with four other girls that looked younger than her, and they were all five silently walking up the driveway to the Irwin house. Calum had never seen those four other girls before, and he’d never quite heard his sister be so quiet before, either.

    “Mali-Koa?” he asked, cautiously poking her shoulder.

    She whirled around, looking ready for battle. The girl was glaring, giving Calum a clear view of her short, wavy black hair and angry brown eyes.

    It also gave him a view of her face, which, despite the glare and eyes closely resembled his and mali-Koa’s.

    This wasn’t her, he realized. This was not Mali-Koa Hood.

    “What.”

    The girl’s voice, along with her dark, angry tone, dragged Calum out of his thoughts.

    He noticed that not a single one of the five girls was looking very happy, and it was probably his fault.

    “She’d not your sister, Calum,” the blonde-haired girl said icily.

    Suddenly, Calum thought he heard her voice in his head. I think you need to go now.

    “Okay,” he said aloud, obediently turning to go away. “I think I need to go now.”

    The blonde smirked.

    “Thanks, M,” the girl-who-was-apparently-not-his-sister said gratefully.

    “Welcome,” the blonde girl responded easily. “I love this power….”

    What? Calum thought as he walked away. He blinked. It felt like he was waking up from a dream. Why had he walked away without an answer? Why did that girl look like him and his sister? Why had he heard the other girl’s voice in his head, and what power was she talking about? And how had she known his name?

    “Well?” Michael asked once Calum got back.

    “She’s not Mali-Koa,” he said simply, and abruptly began walking towards the Irwin house.

    Frowning, Luke and Michael followed their friend up to the porch and into the Irwin home.

    The three high school freshmen stopped dead in the hall. Not a single one of them had ever gone to a party before, unless all those kiddie parties from back in elementary school were counted—which, of course, they weren’t.

    It was as if a large cartoon thought bubble had appeared above their heads: So this is what a party’s like….

    “Well,” Luke said sternly to Calum and Michael (specifically Michael), interrupting the wannabe-manga moment, “have fun, don’t get drunk, and don’t hook up with anyone.”

    “Well, you’re no fun,” Michael whined, pouting. It was impossible to tell how serious he was.

    “And don’t you flirt too much with Ashton Irwin’s sis, either,” Calum teased, grinning hugely and making Luke flush.

    The three of them solemnly promised to try and stick together, and with that, went with the crowd into the first door they saw.

**[ C.L.M. ]**

 

    It was hard to fit in and not gape at every little thing at first. But then the three boys adjusted to the loud music and talking and dancing and everything, and that was that.

    “It’s somehow…not quite what I expected,” Calum commented.

    “What do you think this is, a club?” Michael replied a bit snarkily. “We’ve gotta wait a few more years before we investigate those, Cal. Unfortunately.” It was, again, impossible to tell how serious he was being.

    “Mm.” “Cal” nodded, scanning the crowd for familiar faces. Instead of the faces of people he knew, the faces that immediately stood out were the faces of the five girls from earlier.

    Maybe it was their expressions that made Calum feel uneasy. The five girls seemed to look a bit too serious to blend in with the other laughing, chatting teens. Maybe they were sent by HEAD, Calum mused. HEAD did control most, if not all, governments and countries. They could be making sure that there wasn’t any underaged drinking or anything else that wasn’t approved by HEAD.

    As Calum watched the five, he tried his best to make it look like he wasn’t doing as such.

    Luke, however, noticed that one of his best mates was distracted. He frowned, trying to pinpoint the source of Calum’s distraction.

    Unfortunately for him, Calum noticed Luke’s curiosity before Luke could see the girls.

    “Whatcha lookin’ at?” Luke asked lightly, a small, crooked grin on his face. “See someone good-looking?”

    “…Yeah,” Calum half-lied, forcing a grin. Though that girl with dark skin was kinda pretty….

    “Who?” Luke pried.

    “Why…me, of course!” Calum grinned, pretending to be a narcissist.

    Luke fake-pouted. “What about me?”

    Calum immediately understood and play-acted along with his friend. “…Fine. you’re good-looking, too.”

    “Yay!” Luke cheered in a poor attempt of acting like a girl. He clapped his hands. “Thanks, Cally-Wally!” he cried in a high-pitched voice.

    The brunette frowned. “Cally-Wally?”

    “Cake,” Michael randomly interrupted after having been unusually quiet for a few minutes.

    The two turned to stare at him.

    “What?” Luke asked, confusedly stopping with his terrible acting.

    Michael pointed toward a table of refreshments. “Cake.”

    And, indeed, there was cake.

    “C’mon,” ordered Michael, the die-hard cake-lover. “Oh, and by the way, Luke, avoid auditioning for the school play, will ya?”

    Frowning slightly, Luke muttered a reluctant “fine” as he followed Michael and Calum across the room. **  
**

 

 **[ C.L.M. ]** ****

    Michael, Luke, and Calum were stuffing their faces with cake when Calum saw it.

    The five girls from earlier were looking around cautiously, making sure nobody saw them. Then they slipped through a door that had a sign on it asking people to please not enter.

    “Hey.” Calum poked Luke, and then Michael, who paused with a mouthful of chocolate cake. Calum gestured to the door, where you could just barely see the blonde girl disappearing behind it.

    “Hey. They’re not supposed to go there, are they?” Luke wondered aloud.

    Michael tried to say something, but choked on cake instead. He coughed violently and nodded, his gray eyes watering.

    “…We should go after them. They’re suspicious,” Calum said, surprising even himself.

    After a brief discussion, the three crept over to the door and, when they thought nobody was looking, slipped quietly and quickly behind it.

 **  
** **[ A. ]**

 

    Across the room, the host of the party frowned. He’d seen both parties go through the door.

    Where did they think they were going?


	4. TWO

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter two. Shit goes down at the party, but maybe not quite how you think.

**~ TWO ~**

  **  
**

 

**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

  

        “If anyone catches us, you blackmailed us,” Luke nervously said for about the umpteenth time.

        “I get it, Luke,” an exasperated Calum whispered yet again. “In fact, I got it the first time you said it. Now, shush.”

        “Lucky you. He didn’t actually blackmail you.” Michael paused dramatically. “He threatened to take my cake!” He clutched his cake tightly in his hands.

       “You better finish that cake soon,” Calum warned, creeping forward. “Otherwise it’ll get in the way.”

       The three came to a corner in the dark hall. Michael started to go around it, but Calum quickly pulled him back.

        Michael started to protest, but was shut up by Luke, who put a hand over Michael’s mouth and pointed silently around the corner.

        Michael peered around the corner with wide green eyes.

       There were the five girls.

      They were huddled in a circle around a door, and one of them had her hands on the knob, eyes shut tight in either concentration or constipation, judging from her expression. But Michael, Luke, and Calum seriously doubted it was constipation. At least, Calum and Luke did.

       Suddenly, an audible click could be heard, and the girl’s eyes flew open in triumph. “Yes!” she whisper-yelled. Her rainbow-colored hair swished back and forth as she silently cheered.

        The girl with the dark skin opened the door, revealing darkness behind it. Then the girl-who-wasn’t-Calum’s-sister stepped forward. “All right,” she said briskly. “You know what we’re here for, so let’s get it.”

       The other four girls nodded obediently.

       And with that, the girls disappeared into the dark doorway.

       Calum, Luke, and Michael looked curiously at the door, then each other. Luke still had his hand over Michael’s mouth.

        “So do we go after them?” Luke asked the other two. He yelped suddenly, uncovering Michael’s mouth. “Did you just lick me?!” He glared at Michael.

       “Of course!” Michael grinned and nodded.

       “Mikey…,” groaned Calum.

       Michael frowned, suddenly sober again. (Though he’d never actually been drunk. But hey, it’s a figure of speech.) “But do you really need to ask?” he countered.

       Luke opened his mouth, then closed it abruptly. Then he opened it again, a bit like a fish.

      Calum stopped their argument before it even began. "Let's go." He walked around the corner and towards the doorway.

       Without hesitation, Michael followed.

      Luke closed his mouth for a second time and hesitated before following his friends.

      When the hand closed over his shoulder, he let out a strangled yelp.

      Eyes wide with fear, Michael and Calum whirled around to gape at Luke and the person behind him.

A teenaged boy with dirty blond hair and hazel eyes behind glasses stared accusingly at them.

      “What the hell do you three think you’re doing?!” Ashton Irwin, junior and host of the party, questioned angrily.

      "W-we, uh, we…. Well,” Luke stammered, wrenching away from the pissed junior. It was generally not a good idea to anger the host of the party you were attending, and yet Luke and his friends had done just that.

      “C-Calum….” Michael gestured to Calum and nearly launched his cake at the brunette. “He, uh, well—”

      “Someone went down there,” Calum interrupted. He pointed into the darkness. “Five girls. Five girls went this way, and we didn’t know what else to do, so we, like, followed them.”

      Ashton frowned. “What would five girls have to do in my basement…?” he mused. He paused briefly and thought about it, while the three busted freshmen in front of him shrugged their shoulders.

      Suddenly, Ashton’s eyes widened. “My father’s lab is down there!” he realized, his eyes widening and then narrowing. “They must be enemies of HEAD!”

      The eyes of Ashton’s new freshman acquaintances widened. An enemy of HEAD was not good news, nor would it be a fun thing to face off, that was for sure.

      “Well, what do we do?!” Luke asked breathlessly.

      “Call someone, right? Shouldn’t we call someone?” Calum inputted.

     “My dad—” Ashton began, then changed his mind. “We need to make sure nothing gets taken. Someone call 888 on the way down the stairs.”

   “But isn’t that against protocol?! ‘Don’t take on anyone against HEAD unless you are an official,’” Luke quoted. His parents were loyal and devoted supporters of HEAD, so he’d grown up in a strict, pro-HEAD environment. He, of all people, would know.

   Ashton shrugged, refusing to admit the ever-present curiosity about what was down there. (Hey, if a parent was hiding something in the basement, what normal teen boy wouldn’t be curious?) He hurried through the doorway, forcing the other three to follow, whether it was voluntary or not.

    And so the four boys went downstairs and into possible danger.

 **  
** **[ C.A.L.M. ]** ****

    “Who even invited you three?” Ashton questioned curiously, seeing as he didn’t recall doing so himself.

    “Your sister.” Michael replied.

    “I don’t have one.”

    Meanwhile, Luke was quickly punching numbers into his cell phone. He held the device up to his ear. “No service here, guys,” he said after a few hopeful seconds. “I can’t even reach 888.”

    “Oh.” Ashton frowned. “Oh, well. But they’re just girls. They shouldn’t be too hard to take care of.”

    “‘Easy is the descent,’” quoted Calum, unwittingly revealing that he had read a romance novel mainly meant for girls.

    “Moving on,” suggested Michael, gesturing with his cake for them to be more quiet. “And why is it taking so long for us to get down the stairs? How long are they?”

    “Ask the author of this, not me.”

    “…What?!”

    “What?” Calum shrugged.

    Michael frowned.

    “…But seriously,” continued Ashton in a whisper. “I don’t have a sister.”

    Luke, putting his cell away, butted in. “What about Lauren? She skipped a year and is in our grade.”

    “Oh, you mean my cousin?” Ashton began. “Yeah, Lauren’s my—”

    “Do you hear anyone?” a female voice asked.

    The four boys froze.

    “…No,” another feminine voice replied after a few seconds of silence. Then a door at the bottom of the stairs creaked shut.

    Stunned, the four boys stayed in breathless silence for a moment. Then, looking at each other for reassurance, they slowly crept forward as one.

    When they got to the bottom of the stairs, there was a small, dark hallway to tiptoe through. It was just barely lit by a sliver of light coming from the partially-closed door at the very end.

    And then Calum, Ashton, Luke, and Michael were at the door to the basement.

    The boys glanced anxiously at each other once more, to see who would dare crack the door open wider. Then, with a sigh, Ashton slowly and gently placed his hand on the door. It only made sense, though; it was his house, and his father’s workshop, thus giving him a reason (though not much of one) to be there and do the honors.

    But a minute passed, and Ashton had yet to open the door.

    Michael nudged the older boy impatiently.

    Surprised, Ashton gave a start, and he jolted open the door.

    Now, if this had been a perfect world of a fictitious story, the door would have softly opened a sliver, and the four boys would have been able to quietly watch what was going on inside the room.

    Of course, that was the exact opposite of what actually happened.

    Ashton apparently didn’t know what the definition of spying was, because he accidentally shoved the door wide open. It was a wide door, but it still managed to fly wide open and loudly slam into the wall, thudding loudly as it did so.

    The boys all froze, gaping in surprise and shock.

    The girl-who-wasn’t-Calum’s-sister whirled around, brown eyes narrowed. The tallest girl mirrored her, though her eyes were considerably more wide and panicked. The rainbow-hair girl was so startled that when she spoke, she broke into another language. The blonde girl was completely unnerved, mouth hanging open in a little “o.”

    But the dark-skinned girl had the worst reaction by far. She gave a small shriek and turned around quickly, but that was the normal part. What she did next changed all nine lives forever.

    Calum, Ashton, Luke, and Michael must have interrupted something big, perhaps even the theft of something, because the dark-skinned girl had been holding a small vial filled with a bright red liquid when they opened the door.

    And then, while she was turning, the vial slipped from her fingers and clattered to the floor, breaking into tiny pieces and spilling the red substance. **  
**


	5. TWO-AND-A-QUARTER

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 2.25 because that is now a thing. It's just Vi and I being idiots, really. Feel free to skip it.
> 
> (Note: Every two chapters, there will be a chapter _.25. These will be filled with random bonus content for the story.)
> 
> (WARNING: MINOR INAPPROPRIATE CONTENT BECAUSE VI IS AN ASEXUAL WITH A LOVE FOR SEX JOKES.)

**~ BREAKING NEWS FROM TWO IDIOTS ~**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**a little bonus thingie we came up with. you get to see a bit of who we both are. we’ll do this every so often…or every other chapter…or every chapter….**

**(suddenly, i feel kinda sorry for you. dealing with our insanity and all….)**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**(last chapter’s author’s note I AM NOT INCLUDING A/Ns BECAUSE THEY AREN'T IMPORTANT REALLY)**

**you’ll find out why the emergency number is 888 later.**

**and ash, btw, lives with his dad, thinks that his siblings and mother are his cousins and aunt (because it’s an au) JUST BECAUSE. that’s gonna basically be my excuse for everything. lol**

**(tho seriously. you’ll find out why later. muahahahaha—annnd you guys don’t even care anymore. moving on.)**

 

**so how’s it looking so far? two chapters, and they’ve both basically been cliffhangers. i’m just awesome like that. :P and yes, i do hate you that much.**

**(jk. no. i love you guys. you get me reads and votes and comments, anyway~)**

 

**i always say i’ll make my notes shorter, and that never seems to happen, eh? *le sigh* whatevs.**

**vote, comment, and please, read on!**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**jesus, your author’s notes are starting to rival mine in length (and that’s saying something).**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**suck it, loser. >:D **

 

**(HERE COMES SAID INAPPROPRIATE STUFFS.... ;^; Vi you have ruined me)**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**but I’m asexual. I don’t suck. if anyone were to suck it’d be you.**

**btw, are you a spitter? or do you swallow?**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**a) i’m a proud virgin :P (violent: oral or actual like, penis in the vagina?) urk, um, both?? i don’t know what you mean…. (violent: does kissing count as oral? I know bjs do...) i dunno…. -_-’**

**b) i don’t really want to find out which (LATER NOTE: this was before i realized i’m asexual...now i don’t know, and—thank Doitsu—i don’t plan on finding out…. -_-)**

**c) are we really doing this?!**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**I think this should go in the book. it’s amusing. at least to me. and that should count.**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**wait. so we’re actually posting this?**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**it could be like a bonus or some shit. “chapter 2.5”**

**YEAH LET’S DO THAT**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**it’d have to be…i dunno. but there’s a 10.5 already…. (HINTFORESHADOWINGHINT)**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**the editor says we’re doing it. so it’s final.**

**and let’s just say author’s note or something.**

**(or “breaking news from two idiots” or something stupid)**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**YES.**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**it’s final then.**

**brb, my unfinished english homework is yelling at me to bullshit the shit out of it.**

**(yes, it speaks to me. I’m that sleep-deprived.)**

 

**[ jseoi josei (changed to that by vi) ]**

 

**lol wut**

**i can’t spell, peoples**

**NONONONONONONONONONONONO WAIT A MINNIT I COULD JUST CHANGE IT**

**I’M DUMC DUMB**

**(and still can’t spell)**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**did you get the joke though?**

**(neither can I, don’t worry)**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**yes, i did. :P**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**now I seriously need to get off of my parents will probably murder me -and then who would you have to edit this story?**

**(and let’s not forget about all the other shit I have to update or else at least twenty people will probably gang up and murder me. not that it’d do much, my soul has already been sucked so….)**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**yeahhh….**

**but given your horrible speling skilz, do i really want you to edit this? hehe**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**I’m better at it than you, ya dipshit, and you know it**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

***in emo corner***

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**HEY I’M THE ONE WITH THE EMO FRINGE**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**details**

**(and i’m the one with the dyed hair now)**

**but you should really do your homework. i’ll put this in another document and call it that news flash thing.**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**I would but we’re already at eight pages and I want to get it to nine dammit.**

**(leave it here, I can format it into watty fine.)**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**awww**

**but i want it to be pretty on google drive too**

**(damn ocd)**

**IT MUST BE PRETTY O.o heHEheHEhe**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**well then do whatever ever the absolute fuck you want, as long as this is there and I can share it with the world so everyone can laugh at our complete idiocy**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

***runs into wall***

**why? BECAUSE I CAN**

**…**

**i don’t even know what that was, but okay.**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**josie, I can’t even anymore. I tried, but -but I can’t even. (I can’t odd either, but I had math last semester so don’t you dare give me shit.)**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

***salutes* SIR, YES, SIR :D**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**good, you’re acknowledging me AS THE SUPREME RULER OF THE WATTYS**

**jk.**

 

**GOOD FUCKING NIGHT WE HIT NINE PAGES WOOP FUCK YOU WORLD**

**BUT**

**GOOD**

**NIGHT**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**night.**

**(and btw, i could be planning to overthrow you.)**

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**lol you’re funny.**

**like you could.**

**ANYWAYS I’M LOGGING OFF NOW**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**night**

 

**[ josie ]**

 

**and that is what us idiots who have no life do in our spare time. please don’t run away screaming. please.**

**(you still need to finish reading C.A.L.M. first…. and HEY. compromise: finish reading C.A.L.M.. then you can run away screaming.)**

 

**but seriously.**

**see ya!**

**(or not, cuz this is through the internet, but…oh, you get it.)**

**(and heehee, she ignored the “ sir , yes, sir ” thingie… >:D keep it between us, dear readers, ‘kay?) **

 

**[ violent ]**

 

**so I’m assuming you didn’t see my reply**

***shakes head***

 

***looks at you, the reader***

**see what I have to deal with?**


	6. THREE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter three. Stuff explodes. That's about it, really. And another cliffhanger, because I love you guys. ;D
> 
> I hope you enjoy! :)

**~ THREE ~**

****  


**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

    Both the four boys and the five girls stared in surprise and shock as the red liquid oozed out onto the floor. The tiles that it touched immediately began to bubble, melt, and steam.

    The Girl-Who-Wasn’t-Calum’s-Sister looked at the four boys, then at the blonde-haired girl. “Why didn’t you see them coming, M?! You should’ve—”

    “The walls, S,” M replied coolly. “The walls are too thick, I told you—!”

    “Stop it, you two,” the tall, brown-haired girl interrupted.

    “Yeah. The mission’s a bust either way,” Rainbow Girl added.

    Smoke was rising off of the tiled floor.

    That’s not the point,” the tall girl continued, gesturing impatiently to the smoking red who-knew-what on the floor. “We need to get out of here!”

    The girls with dark skin nodded in complete and utter agreement.

    “Hey! We’re still here,” Michael pointed out.

    Rainbow Girl bared her teeth in a sort of grin. “Yeah. Yeah, you are….” She motioned for the other girls to hurry out the door, and they did so. When Rainbow Girl hurried out last, she somehow managed to shove the four boys further into the room, without even touching them.

    “Hey!” protested Luke as he stumbled, startled into speaking.

    Grinning, Rainbow Girl raised her hand, and the door swung shut of its own accord. The lock clicked loudly, momentarily drowning out the steaming of the floor as it was consumed by that red stuff.

    Ashton was the first of the boys to recover. He raced over to the door and tugged at it. “Open!” he shouted when it refused to budge. He pounded on the door, his glasses falling to the floor as he did so. “Come on, open! Someone!”

    But it was useless.

    The smoke was spreading more rapidly now.

    “It’s useless!” Michael said, setting down his cake to try and help with something, anything to get them out of there. He started coughing when he accidentally inhaled some of the smoke.

    “How….” Luke covered his nose and mouth with his shirt. “What the hell is that stuff?!”

    “I think—” Something crackled loudly, interrupting Calum. “It’s—it’s gonna blow!”

    “Get down!” Ashton shouted to the others. “Get away and—GET DOWN!!”

    Then the world exploded.

    It was completely white for a millisecond, and then everything went black.

 ****  
**[ C.A.L.M. ]  
**

 

    Michael groaned.

    He rubbed his head, messing up his bright red hair as he did so. His gray eyes fluttered open, glassy in appearance before he woke up completely and managed to focus on something.

    “Wha?” He realized that he was flat on his back, staring up at a soot-covered ceiling.

    Michael sat up, immediately wide-awake, confused for only a few seconds before he remembered what had happened.

    He looked around the lab, taking in the equipment, the tables, the once-white (but now sooty) walls for the first time. And as he wildly looked around, he noticed Calum lying on the ground a few feet away from him, completely zonked out. Luke was just behind the brunette, just barely stirring, and lying near the door was Ashton, groaning and rubbing the back of his head.

    “…Ashton,” Michael hissed.

    The junior sat up, wincing and gingerly probing at the lump on his head. “Ow…what…?”

    “We all…passed out, I think,” Michael replied uncertainly. He reached over and shook Calum’s shoulder, trying to wake him up. Calum stirred, but just barely.

    Ashton felt on his face for his glasses, but didn’t find them there. He felt around on the floor, trying to find them. He successfully managed to find them. Luckily, only a lens had cracked slightly. He slid them on and frowned. Why was everything now blurry? He slipped off his glasses to find everything crystal clear. He put his glasses back on, and everything was blurry again. He took them off, and he could see perfectly again.“Huh.” Ashton shrugged and tossed his glasses aside.

    Having made the discovery that he somehow no longer needed glasses, Ashton glanced at Luke, whose blue eyes were open but glassy and unfocused. He didn’t appear to know where he was, so Ashton leaned over and gently shook him—though maybe not so gently, because he slid sideways a bit.

    Immediately, Luke shot up, his eyes wide and alert. “What? Who? When? Huh?!” He didn’t quite seem to be able to form a single coherent thought.

    “We passed out; ‘we’ is Calum, Ashton, you, and me; I dunno when—it’s probably night or even the day after the party, and I don’t know how to answer ‘huh,’ so I won’t,” Michael rattled off, going in the order Luke had asked the questions in. He figured that it was the best way to fill in his confused friend.

    “Ya don’t say,” Luke groaned, sitting up and rubbing his head, as Ashton, Michael, and now even a still half-asleep Calum had done. “Never would’ve guessed.” He paused. “It’s not like I have amnesia or short-term memory loss or anything, sheesh.”

    The boys were silent for a moment.

    “Hey,” Calum spoke up suddenly after roughly five minutes of silence. “How do we, like, get out of here?”

    “I can try to open the door again,” Ashton volunteered, standing and wincing because of the lump on his head.

    “I’ll look for…a vent, I guess,” Calum said after a moment’s hesitation. “That’s like what they do and how they get out in superhero movies and stories.”

    Michael paused. “Well,” he said loftily, standing and stretching, “I guess I’ll look for secret passageways and stuff.” He ignored the incredulous stares the other three gave him.

    After a moment of awkward silence, Luke said, “And I’ll figure out what the hell that vial had in it.” He stood abruptly.

    And with that, Calum, Ashton, Luke, and Michael went off to perform their separate jobs.

    Calum was the first to report in unsuccessful. There were no vents big enough for them to be found, though there were a few small drains located at various points on the now-marred floor, he claimed.

    Michael was the second person to fail. He looked around, but found nothing. There was a small square of wall that he claimed was darker than the rest, but the other three saw nothing out-of-the-ordinary and decided that Michael was just seeing things.

    Luke wasn’t necessarily unsuccessful, but he was far from successful. He knew and inferred the basics, but couldn’t figure out what the red stuff was made of or how he and the other boys could’ve been affected by it.

    After they were unsuccessful, the other three gathered around Ashton, who hadn’t been able to pick the lock.

    Eventually, Ashton threw the screwdriver down in frustration. “Ugh! It’s not working!”

    He grabbed at the door handle and pulled, frustrated.

    With a creak, the door flew off its hinges and crashed down on the floor beside the four boys.

    Ashton gaped, and the other three boys followed suit, staring with both their eyes and mouths wide.

    “Wha—buh—how?!” Ashton spluttered, speechless, hardly able to form a train of coherent thought. “I—uhh—” His mouth moved, but nothing came out.

    Ashton regained his composure after a few moments.

    “It…. The explosion,” he said, starting to understand it (or so he thought). “The explosion must’ve…loosened the hinges on the door. Yeah.” He nodded, uncertainly agreeing with himself, trying to convince himself of it.

    “Or you could have super strength,” Michael joked, trying to ease tensions and lighten the mood. But Ashton looked at him with such an expression that made Michael shut up.

    “…Let’s go,” Calum and Luke accidentally said at the same time. They half-glared at each other before noticing that Ashton had already headed out of the now-broken door, and realizing that hey, they should probably follow their own advice. They followed behind Ashton.

    Michael started to follow, spotted his cake (miraculously still in one piece), grabbed it, and hurried out of the basement laboratory after his companions.

    Calum, Ashton, Luke, and Michael exited the basement to find the Irwin house completely and utterly silent.

    They crept quietly (save Luke’s muttered cursing when he stubbed his toe in a doorway) into the living room, where the main party had been situated. It was completely deserted except for all the trash and cups and plates and streamers and whatevers. There was even a spilled drink, who knows what it was, in a dried puddle on the carpet.

    Ashton swore softly. “My dad’s gonna kill me when he gets home.” Luckily, Ashton knew that his dad typically stayed overtime at the laboratory he worked at. (He didn’t come home all that much now that Ashton was old enough to fend for himself.)

    Ashton immediately hurried for water and paper towels to clean the mess up.

    Luke so happened to be a step ahead, however. He came back from the kitchen, which he’d somehow managed to find, and wordlessly handed Ashton one of the damp paper towels he had gotten.

    As Luke and Ashton scrubbed at the stubborn, crusty brown stain, Calum looked for a clock, and Michael examined his cake, completely unproductively.

    Calum realized halfway through searching for a clock that he had one in his pocket. “It’s nine-seventeen AM on Saturday,” Calum informed after consulting his phone.

    “So…,” Luke mused from the floor. “The other party-goers must have left before curfew, to avoid getting in trouble.” (There was a curfew of ten o’clock for individuals under eighteen in countries ruled by HEAD.)

    “Good thing I had the party on a Friday night,” Ashton commented, furiously rubbing at that damn stain. “We’re not missing anything, ‘cause we don’t have school on Saturdays, thank god.”

    “Yet,” Michael interjected, still examining his cake. “Have you heard of that stupid bill they want to pass?”

    Luke smiled. He’d never really liked school all that much, but he suddenly found himself liking the concept of getting to learn more. Then he frowned slightly. How odd.

    Ashton frowned right off the bat. He was about to respond to Michael when Calum groaned loudly and interrupted.

    “Us three are screwed, though,” Calum moaned. “Our parents probably called the IRs, and I already have two hours of Service this week for being late to school once….” IRs were what people called the Infraction Recorders, one of the two branches of police in HEAD-ruled lands. They were the ones who recorded the rule-breaking, not the ones who actually went out and enforced the rules. Service was what people who broke fairly minor rules had to do, and tended to be some sort of community service.

Calum, trying to push aside the thought of having to spend two hours of his beautiful Saturday picking up trash in a park, turned and looked at Michael, who was about to place a big hunk of cake in his mouth. “Are you sure you want to eat that?” he asked. “Who knows what the explosion did to it?”

    Michael merely shrugged and put the bite in his mouth.

    Luke turned to see what his mates were talking about. When he saw the cake, his eyes widened. “Don’t eat it!” he shouted, hitting the cake out of Michael’s hands. It flew off the paper plate and proceeded to fall onto the couch, getting stuck between the cushions and being forgotten.

    But it was too late.

    And as the other three boys watched, Michael’s eyes rolled into the back of his head. He crumpled.


	7. FOUR

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapitre quatre. Calum parle au écureuil. Amusez-vous! :)
> 
> (Chapter four. Calum talks to a squirrel. Enjoy!)

**~ FOUR ~**

****  


**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

    “Michael!” Calum shouted. He and Luke bent down. “Mikey! Are you okay?!”

    But the boy on the floor didn’t respond.

           “Michael?” Luke asked cautiously, bending down to his friend’s level. He felt a sudden surge of anger and terror all at once. “Michael. Gordon. Clifford.”

           Michael jolted. He coughed lightly, rolling over, blinking bleary eyes, and spotting the other three boys. “What the hell, Luke?” he mumbled as he dazedly sat up. “You know I hate my middle name.”

           “And you know we’d hate it if you died,” Luke sharply returned. He frowned even more. “Why did you…collapse?”

           “It was…a joke,” Michael replied, sounding uncertain. “Sorry. I, uh, won’t do it again.” He stood up with Calum’s help, and then he abruptly changed the subject. “Shouldn’t we be leaving?”

           “Shit,” Calum muttered, startled into both remembering and cursing. He raced out of the room. “Sorry! Gotta—hurry—!”

           “Oi, you’re not going anywhere without us!” Michael called, seeming to be fully recovered.

           A few mumbled curses could be heard from the hall. “Uhm, where’s the door?” Calum called.

           “…Bye, then,” Ashton spoke up hesitantly. “Oh, and the door is on the far right.”

           Michael and Luke started to leave.

           “Wait!” Ashton called to them. When they turned back around, he spoke seriously to them, face grim.

           “Don’t tell anyone about this.”

**[ C.L.M. ]**

 

           The walk home was fairly quiet. Calum was busy worrying about his Service hours and what he could have to do this time, Michael was busy seeing things—or rather, through things—and becoming convinced that he was either tired or insane, and Luke was in an oddly philosophical, smarty-pants mood, wondering vaguely what the purpose of man’s existence was (of which an odd voice in his head insisted it was twelve).

           They were all three blissfully unaware of what exactly that explosion had done to them.

           Until a squirrel decided to try and cross the road, at least.

           Calum spotted the squirrel first. “Whoa, man!” he said to it. He paused, then corrected himself. “Squirrel. Where do you think you’re going?”

           The squirrel froze, then straightened up and cocked its furry little head. It chattered in a rapid sequence.

           “What?” Calum seemed confused. “Yeah. I am. But that’s not the point!”

           The squirrel squeaked and chattered some more.

           Calum nodded as if he actually understood the squirrel.

           Michael and Luke gaped in silent shock.

           “But crossing the street…that’s dangerous, man,” Calum continued.

           The squirrel seemed affronted. It squeaked once, shrilly.

           “Oh. Sorry, miss. But still!”

           Luke seemed to have recovered from the shock of his best friend trying to talk to a squirrel. “Um, Cal—” he began uncomfortably.

           Just then, a car came roaring by.

           The squirrel jumped backwards slightly. It—or was it a she?—squeaked, again only once, only it seemed less angry and more surprised and shocked.

           “See?” Calum seemed triumphant, whatever point he was trying to prove to the squirrel apparently proven. “You should always look both ways before crossing the street.”

           The squirrel nodded. It chattered a bit more.

           “Oh.” Calum flushed slightly. “O…kay. Erm, I will.”

           The squirrel gave Calum a tiny salute with her tiny, fuzzy paw, then scampered back to the bushes she’d come from.

           Calum waved at the squirrel. Then he continued walking. After a second, he noticed that Michael and Luke weren’t following. He slowed and turned, walking backwards to look at them. “What? C’mon, guys.”

           “Y-y-you just,” Michael gasped. “You just…you just talked to a squirrel!”

           “And?” Calum shrugged, putting his hands behind his head, still walking backwards. “What about it?”

           He froze suddenly, his eyes widening. He slowly lowered his hands. “I just…talked to a squirrel,” he realized. “I just talked to a squirrel!” He turned to Luke, flabbergasted. “Did I just talk to a squirrel?”

           Luke nodded slowly. “There is a ninety-five percent chance that is was the explosion and a five percent chance that you are insane.” He paused. “No, make that ninety and ten.” He paused again. “Where did that come from?”

           “Guys,” Michael said in a slightly quivery voice, “I think something weird’s going on!”

           “You think,” Luke said sarcastically. “You think.”

           Michael frowned, wondering where the sarcasm had come from. “Uh, yeah.”

           “Let’s just go,” Calum interrupted. “We need to go. We’re just tired. We’re…imagining stuff.”

           “Or….” Luke trailed off. Or. Or what?

           The three freshmen somberly looked at each other. They all knew what it could be, what “or” could be, but they were tired. They were tired and in denial and didn’t want to say or even think what it could be, for fear of what it could mean.

           Calum opened his mouth and then shut it. He opened his mouth again, looking not unlike a fish on land. “…Bye,” he said simply, turning onto his street.

           The three boys silently dispersed and went their own separate ways. **  
**

 

 **[ C. ]** ****  


           When Calum got home, his parents endlessly lectured him about being out late. They accused him of being out with a girl or something, but he quickly cooked up a half-lie about those damn seniors picking on the eensy weensy freshmen again, and how they’d found it amusing to lock him and a few others in the basement of the house the party had been in. They had only just managed to escape.

           When Calum’s overbearing and overprotective parents insisted on calling Ashton, the junior luckily verified his story. It was, after all, slightly true, if you just substituted seniors with five crazy girls that may or may not have some odd powers, and if you added a mysterious exploding substance to the mix.

           After the lecture finally stopped, Calum was sent by still-irritated parents to Service. He spent two hours helping out at a marathon (the chosen Service of the week) in the August air, which was starting to become slightly warmer again. While he walked home, he talked to two more squirrels, a lost baby bird that he promptly returned to its nest, and a sick dog whose owner thought Calum was insane when he told the guy to get his pooch checked out.

           When Calum got home again, he asked his parents to arrange a meeting between him and a therapist. Then he promptly went to his room and, completely exhausted, was out like a light.

**[ A. ]**

           Ashton spent his entire day cleaning up the mess left by his schoolmates. He was unable to get the drink stain out of the carpet, and simply dragged the table over it, wondering why it was feeling so light all of a sudden.

           When Calum’s parents called, demanding answers, he wearily said Calum’s story about the seniors was true and apologized for “not noticing it”. After all, it wasn’t a complete lie.

           Ashton’s father called just after Calum’s parents did, informing his son that he’s be away at the lab for a few days, leaving Ashton on his lonesome. Again.

           After that phone call, Ashton was in a decidedly worse mood. (And his day had already been sucky enough…damn mysterious exploding substances and persistent drink stains.) He stomped into the hall, putting away party favors in a hall closet, but must’ve been too forceful when he shoved them onto the shelf, because a giant, heavy black box wobbled, then fell on him. Somehow, instead of being knocked out and getting the inevitable concussion, Ashton instinctively reached out and caught it.

           After weighing the box on a scale and determining that what he had just done was supposed to be impossible, Ashton easily lifted the box back into place and stared down at his hands in surprise.

           Ashton resolved to never have a party again.

**[ L. ]**

 

           Luke spent his entire day being yelled at, grounded, confined to his room, deprived of any and all electronics (the horror…), and forced to do nothing else but study and do homework. Thus, he spent the rest of Saturday, and even all of Sunday (save the mandatory two hours of church that HEAD required all citizens have), doing just that. To his surprise, even things he hadn’t known or understood before managed to stick more easily in his brain.

           When Luke took the test that following Monday, he aced it, not missing a single question, despite the fact that it was his worst subject. His teacher was convinced that Luke had cheated at first, but when Luke easily rattled off a summary of the entire unit, the teacher became pleased that Luke was “finally applying himself.”

           Luke spent his entire lunch period in the library, using computers and books to attempt to figure out just what exactly that red substance was. Unfortunately, he had just as much luck finding out things as he did in his love life: none.

  

**[ M. ]**

 

           Now, while the other boys were only mildly convinced that they were going insane, poor Michael had it the worst. His parents didn’t seem to particularly care about where he’d been, so long as he hadn’t gotten a girl pregnant. They left for a trip to Europe almost immediately after he returned home. Michael had the house, the TV, and a couple of microwave meals to himself.

           He turned on the television and tried (and failed) to study for a test he had in his least favorite subject, but he had to call it a night when he started to think that he could see through the textbook and the desk to the standard-issue white carpet underneath.

           Michael failed the test the following Monday, envious of the 100% Luke had somehow gotten. He was walking to lunch with Calum when he heard something in a janitor’s closet. He walked closer, curious, only to hear moaning. From there it was easy to tell what was going on, and Michael, disgusted, was about to walk away when something weird happened. Michael could’ve sworn that next he saw through the door, and what he saw—or thought he saw—wasn’t pretty.

Two people were in there—the most promiscuous girl in school and a boy from Michael’s math class—engaging in some…interesting activities. To be blunt, they were having s.e.x. Gak.

           Neither of the two ever showed up in the lunchroom, and the boy wasn’t in math class after lunch, so Michael figured that maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t actually seeing things. It wasn’t the first time that had happened over the past few days, either.

           After school, Michael panicked and raced to go find Calum and Luke.


	8. FOUR-AND-A-QUARTER

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter four-and-a-quarter. The translation of Calum's chat with the squirrel from the previous chapter.

**~ BREAKING NEWS FROM TWO IDIOTS ~**

  


**[ josie ]**

 

**this just in. with the help of a translator (cough cally-wally cough), we have managed to translate what mr. calum hood and ms. squirrel were saying in the previous chapter.**

 

**cally-wally: chapter? of what? is this a story? are we all...MADE UP?!?!?! :O**

 

**josie: umm...no? (technically you’re based off of a real person, cal….) *shoves cally-wally back into the story* GET BACK IN THERE, YOU.**

 

**cally-wally: so we ARE in a story?!**

 

**josie: I ADMIT TO NOTHING. *hypnotizes calum* AND YOU REMEMBER NOTHING.**

 

**cally-wally: okee. i ‘member nothin’. bai now. *goes back into the story***

 

**phew. got that taken care of.**

 

**ANYWHOVIAN (yes i did just do that x3), i shall now present to thee, the ama-zayn translation of the calum-squirrel conversation! :D enjoy!**

 

**Calum: Whoa, man! *pauses* Squirrel. *pauses again* Where do you think you’re going?**

 

**Squirrel: *freezes* *straightens up* *tilts head, confused* Squeakity squeak?! Squeak squeak squeak!**

**(Translation: You’re talking to me?! But you’re human!)**

 

**Calum: What? Yeah, I am. But that’s not the point!**

 

**Squirrel: Squeak! Squeak, squeak squeakity squeak squeak. Squeak squeak squeakity squeak.**

**(Translation: Wow! Well, I’m trying to cross this big black road-thingie. I have relatives on the other side.)**

 

**Calum: *nods* But crossing the street…that’s dangerous, man.**

 

**Squirrel: Squeak?! Squeak squeak, squeakity squeak!**

**(Translation: Excuse me?! I’m not male, you squeakity squeak! [“squeakity squeak” is left untranslated for censorship reasons. There may be children reading this. Those of you learning squirrel, please do not use this phrase. It will most likely offend the squirrel you are talking to.])**

 

**Calum: Oh. Sorry, miss. *pauses* But still!**

 

**Luke: Um, Cal—**

 

**Car: *goes roaring by* VROOM VROOM~ :D**

 

**Squirrel: ?! *jumps backwards* Squeak!**

**(Translation: Gah!)**

 

**Calum: See? You should always look both ways before crossing the street.**

 

**Squirrel: *nods* Squeak squeak squeak. *pauses* Squeak squeak squeakity, squeak squeak!**

**(Translation: I’ll be careful. *pauses* If you’re ever interested in making human-squirrel hybrids, come to me!)**

 

**Calum: Oh. *flushes* O…kay. Erm, I will.**

 

**(lol no he won’t cuz i already know who i’m shipping him with. and she’s not a squirrel….)**

 

**Squirrel: *salutes* Squeak! *leaves***

**(Translation: Bye!)**

 

**annnd that’s that. i hope you enjoy. it took loads of time to translate! it turns out that google translate won’t translate squirrel (i shall be complaining about that), so i had to actually find someone who spoke squirrel….**

  
**that’s it for now, you lot! i hope you’re liking the story so far! there are forty-five chapters planned, so we’re only roughly one-ninth of the way through so far. :3 it’s gonna be fun…. >:3 MUAHAHAHA  
**


	9. FIVE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter five. The boys realize something weird really is going on, panic, and Calum gets almost-naked (but probably for none of the reasons that you might think...).
> 
> (P.S. I forgot to edit out the author's note at first...I fixed it fast, so I don't think anyone noticed, though.)
> 
> (P.P.S. Happy Halloween! :D)

**~ FIVE ~**

**[ C.L.M. ]**

 

 

“What the hell is going on?!” Michael panicked, anxiously pacing across his living room. “I can see through shit—I—I’ve been scarred for life! Do you know what it’s like to see two people you know screwing?!”

“It is better than seeing three people doing that,” muttered Luke, who was, for some reason, using cynicism and sarcasm more all of a sudden.

           “Calm down, Mikey,” Calum said, exasperated. “You think Luke and I haven’t had problems ourselves? My new therapist thinks I’m insane because I claimed I talked to a squirrel! I didn’t even tell her about the other squirrels, or the bird, or the dog! Or the goldfish,” he added thoughtfully. “Your goldfish left his tank and everything in it to you in his will, by the way. He told me before he died earlier,” Calum said to Michael.

           Michael frowned in some combination of sadness and skepticism.

           “And Luke…Luke passed a test!” Calum continued, seeing Michael's continued disbelief.

           “Excuse me?!” Luke protested.

           “Okay, Luke…aced a test in his worst subject,” Calum corrected. He half-glared at Luke. “Happy now?”

           Luke nodded. “I am very much so.” He turned to Michael. “Anyway, do continue your panicked rambling and ranting.” And was there a hint of a British accent in there, for some odd reason?

           Michael nodded and continued. “Well, I kinda see what you mean, but…. At least you guys weren’t scarred for life, were you?!” Michael said accusingly. “Well?!”

           “Calum’s therapist probably was,” Luke muttered to himself. Louder, though, he said, “I think that we all know where these weird things are coming from and why they are happening.”

           Luke waited for one of the other two to say it, but Michael was still in mild panic-mode and refused to do so. Calum opened his mouth but then closed it, then opened and closed it again. It seemed that he was attempting to impersonate Michael's poor, dead fish.

           “Erm, shouldn’t we keep it down? Michael’s parents—” Calum finally began.

           “Aren’t here, which is why we are,” Michael finished.

           “Michael, Calum, let us get back on track,” Luke interrupted before any arguments could break out. He paused momentarily, and then answered the unasked question of what was causing this.

           “It was that substance.”

           Michael fell into a slightly sullen silence, or perhaps he was just in mourning for his lost goldfish.

           Calum licked his lips nervously before he spoke. “What did it…what did it do to us?” Even though they were the only three people in the house, his voice was a low, soft whisper.

           Luke shrugged. “I do not know. I did research but did not find anything.”

           Michael spoke up suddenly. “Say that it…gave us all superpowers?”

           Calum stared at him.

           “Like…I have x-ray vision. That would explain seeing through things. And Cal, you can talk to animals. Maybe you can even understand other languages—we’ll have to look into that. And you, Luke….” Michael paused. “You’re smart now. Well, smarter than before,” he hastily added, seeing Luke’s glare.

           “It…kinda does make sense,” Calum said thoughtfully.

           “I do not buy it,” Luke stated decisively. “It is not physically possible!”

           “Well then, what’s with the lack of contractions in your speech now?” Michael questioned.

           Luke seemed genuinely surprised. “What? I am not—I’m not using contractions?” He winced slightly upon saying “I’m.”

           Michael nodded. “Your brain’s probably telling you that you shouldn’t use them, just like you wouldn’t in an English paper.”

           Luke frowned. “But that still does not—doesn’t—mean anything!” he protested.

           “Luke, what’s the square root of…1,417?” Calum randomly interjected.

           “Rounded to the nearest tenth, it is thirty-seven point six.” Luke blinked. “What the hell?”

           “…He’s right,” Calum said, looking at his phone’s calculator.

           Michael took over the sort-of quiz. “Name the capital of Chile.”

           “Santiago. But—”

           “The comma before the ‘and’ or ‘or’ when listing things. Is it necessary?”

           “The comma is called the Oxford Comma. Most people use it; however, it is not considered completely necessary in today’s society.” Luke frowned. “Granted, anything grammatically correct is not considered necessary anymore, thanks to texting and the like.” Luke frowned and blinked, mouth opened slightly in surprise.

           “Thanks,” Calum interrupted the interrogation. “I have a grammar test tomorrow.”

           “Calum.” Michael turned to his other mate. “My goldfish left me what before he died, exactly?”

           “Umm, his bowl and everything in it,” Calum replied, surprised. “Oh, and he says one of the rocks at the bottom of the bowl is valuable, too—”

           Michael grabbed the forlorn, fishless bowl from a table in the corner of the room. He marched out onto the front porch and dumped the contents of the bowl onto the driveway. Pebbles scattered everywhere, and Michael sorted through them until he found a cut green stone that he picked up and showed to the others.

           “An emerald,” he announced. “My mother must’ve dropped it in when cleaning the bowl…this thing’s been missing for months.” Michael stared pointedly at Luke.

           “Okay…,” Luke admitted weakly. “Maybe the three of us have…‘superpowers.’”

           Calum froze suddenly. “‘The three of us’?” he quoted, frowning. “What about—”

           “Ashton,” Luke and Michael chorused in grim unison.

           “Yeah….” Calum nodded uneasily. “Ashton.”

 

**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

 

           The phone seemed to ring forever before Ashton picked it up. “…Hello?” he asked warily.

           “It’s Michael,” said redhead replied into the phone.

           “Michael.” The name didn’t seem to ring any bells for Ashton.

           “The guy with the bright red hair,” Michael tried. “You know, from the party on Friday?”

           There was about a minute or so of silence before Ashton spoke again. “…Hi, Michael,” he said coolly, obviously on-guard now. “Why are you calling?”

           “Well, Calum, Luke, and I wanted to ask you—” Michael began, only to be interrupted by Luke, who grabbed the phone away from Michael. “Hey!” he protested.

           “It is Luke now,” Luke spoke tersely into the phone. “I am also from the party. We are having a bit of a problem right now.”

           If possible, Ashton seemed to become even more on-guard. “What is it?” he asked sharply, in a tone that could only mean that odd things were happening to him as well.

           “…Michael’s goldfish died, and we wanted to invite you to the funeral we are having here at Michael’s house.” Luke spoke slowly and carefully, enunciating every syllable and hoping that Ashton understood the implication that it wasn’t safe to talk about it on the phone.

           Ashton paused. “Okay,” he said in a clipped tone. “I’ll, uh, be right there.”

           “Good.” Luke quickly gave Ashton Michael's address. “And hurry. Goldie’s funeral is about to start.”

           Luke hung up without waiting for Ashton’s reply, handing the cellular phone back to its owner, Michael.

           Calum wanted to know why Luke had done what he had and said what he did, so Luke elaborated quickly.

           Michael had one thing and one thing only to say: “My goldfish’s name wasn’t Goldie! It was Jonathan Pineapple Endington the Second!”

           Calum and Luke totally weren’t questioning the sanity of Michael after that one.

 

**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

 

           “So.” Michael broke the awkward silence.

           He, Calum, and Luke were sitting on the puke green couch in his family’s living room, while Ashton fidgeted uncomfortably on an armchair directly opposite them.

           “So,” Ashton echoes. He attempted a weak jab at humor. “Did I miss the funeral?”

           Michael nodded solemnly.

           “Oh, well. I did want to pay my respects to him….” Ashton trailed off, seeing no one smiling. Then he caught sight of the empty bowl that resided on a small table in a corner of the room. “Wait, your fish actually died?!”

           “That is not the point.” Luke took over, his voice suddenly sounding extremely English. “We have called you here on this fine morn to discuss a matter of the utmost importance—”

           “Just get to the point, Shakespeare,” Calum butted in sourly. He wasn’t in a good mood, having just been dissed by the dog that belonged to Michael’s next door neighbor. He really wasn’t Asian!

           Luke frowned at the Shakespeare jab, shook himself out of his newfound “merry olde English” mode, and explained everything that had happened to Ashton in both perfect clarity and perfect lack of contractions.

           “So.” Calum sidled over to Ashton once Luke had finished his long-winded explanation. “Has any weird stuff happened to you, too?”

“…No,” Ashton said hesitantly. “It hasn’t.”

           Luke looked into Ashton’s hazel eyes and could somehow discern the truth. He saw the hesitation in the junior’s eyes.

           “You are lying,” Luke stated matter-of-factly.

           “Wh-what?” Ashton stammered. “N-no, I’m not,” he stammered. “Wh-why would I?”

           “Aw, you can tell us,” Michael persuaded encouragingly.

           Calum leaned down and poked Ashton. “Come on. Any weird stuff…?”

           “No,” Ashton insisted, poking Calum back.

           Calum flew across the room and landed in only underwear and a sock.

           Michael and Luke stared. **  
**


	10. FIVE-AND-A-HALF

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every five chapters, there will be a _#_.5 (5.5, 10.5, 15.5....) These will be chapters not from the point of view of the boys.
> 
> Chapter five-and-a-half. We learn more about the girls from the party. Bonus PoV of an unknown (but it's not hard to guess who it is) at the end.
> 
> I hope that you enjoy this chapter/half-chapter/whatever! :D

**~ FIVE-AND-A-HALF ~**

 

 

**[ S.T.O.R.M. ]**

 

           A blonde-haired girl with practically nothing on and a gangly guy with flaming red hair and a major acne problem walked down the street, talking and laughing. They looked both ways, saw no cars (or people, or other life at all, for that matter), and crossed the street. Their smiles disappeared as the guy glanced meaningfully at an alleyway and curtly nodded his head before continuing to laugh jovially as he followed the blonde inside a small house.

           Three figures darted out of the alleyway, revealing themselves to be a dark-skinned girl with long dreadlocks, thick eyebrows, and a surprisingly large nose, a girl with dyed-black hair and heavy emo-looking makeup (specifically eyeliner), and a girl with a brown bob, braces, glasses, and a pimply face.

           The three girls hurried across the street, not bothering to look either way, and hurried in the house after the other two teenagers.

           Once all five of the teens were inside the tiny house, the sole male of the group yanked off his unruly red hair, letting wavy, longish brown hair cascade down across his/her shoulders.

           “Phew,” he/she sighed, peeling the fake acne off of his/her face, then reaching under his/her shirt and behind the back, unzipping and sliding off a chest binder. “I can actually breathe again!”

           The dark-skinned girl couldn’t hold it in any longer. She burst into loud laughter as she took off the dreads and peeled off the fake eyebrows and bulbous rubber nose.

           The tall teenager with the brown hair wasn’t happy. “Why do I always have to be the guy?!” she raged in a slightly British-accented voice. “It’s not fair!”

           The dark-skinned girl laughed even harder, dropping the fake nose on the floor as she shook.

           The taller girl turned on her companion. “Shut up, Odelia! I’d love to see you wear this wig and chest binder and fake balls and—and stuff!”

           That shut Odelia up.

           “Can it, you lot,” the blonde-haired girl ordered as she took off her own disguise, revealing her true hair to be short, wavy, and black and her eyes to be brown. “You ought to be more solemn—we just failed a mission. Big time.” She slid capris on, ditching the short skirt, and pulled an army jacket out of her bag, putting it on top of the black tank top she wore.

           “Yes, Mother,” the brunette replied sarcastically.

           “Hey, I’m the sass-master, not you,” the emo girl (who by now had ditched the black wig, revealing rainbow-colored hair) objected unconcernedly, scrubbing at the heavy black eyeliner surrounding her olive-green eyes.

           “Therese,” the black-haired girl warned. “Rina, you, too. Now is not the time.”

           Therese sighed. “Okay, Soph. So maybe you have a point.”

           The entire time, the girl with the brown bob remained silent, merely tugging off the bob, revealing long, blonde hair with an orange streak, removing the glasses, and peeling off the stick-on fake acne and fake braces. Suddenly, she stiffened and opened her mouth to speak for the first time.

           “Someone’s coming,” she said sharply.

           The five girls were immediately on the alert.

           “STORM,” a professional-sounding voice said from behind them.

           The girls turned around. “Yes?” they said in practiced unison.

           The woman with the clipboard blinked in surprise, not yet used to the girls’ antics. She was new. She’d get used to them eventually. “U-um, you’re needed in the debriefing room,” she stammered, her professional mannerisms replaced with mild confusion.

           “Okay,” the girls again chorused in unison. Therese and Odelia fought back smiles and laughter, and Rina held back a snicker or two and a smirk, but Sophia and “M” remained blank-faced. The two of them had grown used to the professionalism needed to survive doing what they did.

           The woman quickly excused herself and hurried away.

           “Newb,” Odelia and Rina muttered at the same time, Odelia in an amused tone and Rina in a slightly annoyed tone.

           “Stop it, Rina and Odie,” Therese said, taking the opportunity to tease Odelia.

           “Odie” frowned. “Whatever you say, Terrie.”

           “Hey!” Therese protested, although she had kind of earned it. She sulked.

           “Oi.” M stepped forward, walking down the hall and not glancing back to see if the others were following. “C’mon already.”

           The girls started walking to the debriefing room, chatting amongst themselves.

It didn’t take too long to reach the room, seeing as they were in a very small, very cramped house, and not all secret bases had underground labs (but who would expect a house like that to be the base of an organization like the one they were a part of?).

           The debriefing room had once been the dining room of the house, and dusty cabinets chock-full of even more dusty silverware and china and the like still lined the walls of the room. Old, peeling wallpaper with squashes on it adorned the walls.

           A man waited in a corner of the room, a man the girls didn’t know, a man that didn’t know the girls, and it would stay like that. He tapped his foot and impatiently waited for the girls—who exhibited their rebellion by taking their sweet time to sit down and get comfortable.

           “Well?” the man eventually demanded impatiently, holding his hand out for the vial that he had yet to know no longer existed.

           None of the girls wanted to say it, say that they had failed for the first time in forever.

           “We…don’t actually…have it,” Therese eventually spoke up nervously, fidgeting with the hem of her shirt.

           The man blinked. They had never actually met the guy until now, so this must’ve been one hell of a bad first impression the girls were making.

           “What…?” the guy asked. He seemed to have trouble comprehending Therese’s statement. “You didn’t…get it?” He frowned, starting to get a bit angry.

           All five girls shook their heads, carefully crafted blank looks on their faces.

           “You didn’t?” He shook his head. “You didn’t.”

           “No,” M spoke up boldly and monotonously, “we didn’t.”

           The man’s mouth moved silently, but he quickly seemed to gather his wits about him. He spoke.

           “Why?”

           “Four boys interrupted us,” Odelia spoke up apologetically. “We…I dropped it.” She bowed her head. “I’m sorry!”

           Rina muttered something in that other language. Then she spoke up in English. “It hasn’t been reported yet, though. If we play our cards right, we may be able to prevent that from happening.”

           The man turned to the disinterested-looking blonde. “Who were the boys, M?” the man asked in a dangerously calm voice that indicated he might’ve been planning to make the lives of those four boys hell—or even just end it for them. Who knew, in this business? And the man knew just enough about the girls to know that M would be able to tell him who.

           “Calum Thomas Bennington, Ashton Fletcher Irwin, Lucas Robert Johnson, and Michael Gordon Jones,” she boredly recited from memory.

           The guy’s eyes widened in surprise, then narrowed. He muttered curses that were none-too-quiet and none-too-nice.

           “Them.”

 

**[ I. ]**

 

           He looked up at the big, looming Irwin mansion. It looked just as deserted as the rest of the street did.

           He walked closer to the house, going up the cement driveway jauntily, a spring in his step and a cheerful whistled tune on his lips. He climbed the steps onto the porch, getting out his key as he went.

           Unlocking the door, he went inside, taking off his suit’s jacket and hanging it on the coat rack just beside the front door.

           “Ashton!” he called. “I’m home, my boy!” He smiled broadly, though it didn’t reach his eyes. “I can only stay for dinner before I have to go back to the lab, but that should be ample enough time to catch up!”

           There was no reply.

           “…Ash? Ashton?” He frowned. “Where are you, son?”

           A quick search of the house, first and second floor (and even of the attic), provided no results.

           Ashton wasn’t in the house.

           “Ashton—!” His father was desperate. He paced worriedly down the stairs and down the hall.

           That was when he spotted the half-open door to the basement.

           Ashton’s father hurried through the door and down the stairs, eyes narrowed in worry and anger. He felt a twinge of suspicion. He hadn’t left that door open…say something had happened to his…research…say someone—Ashton—had….

           He reached the bottom of the stairs and rushed to the door at the end of the short, dimly lit hall.

What he saw in the basement was not what he wanted to see.


	11. SIX

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter six. The boys are idiots (like usual), and another cliffhanger because I love you guys~

**~ SIX ~**

 

**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

  

           Calum redressed himself before the boys resumed their conversation.

           “So much for nothing weird going on with you,” he muttered sourly to Ashton.

           “I said I was sorry! I didn’t think that would happen” Ashton protested. “I thought I could control it better!”

           “Well, apparently not,” Calum snapped. “Now my entire body hurts,” he moaned. “Especially my ass.”

           “Oh, get over it,” Ashton retorted. “If this thing, whatever the hell it is, doesn’t stop, and we hang out more together, you’ll get used to it.”

           “Yeah, especially if we do this every day,” Michael chimed in, wiggling his eyebrows mischievously.

           “What?” Calum blinked. “I’m not in if I have to go through that again. “Big guy over there—” he violently jabbed his thumb in Ashton’s direction, “—packs a pretty powerful punch.” He paused. “And a damn powerful poke.” Calum paused again, comprehending what Michael had said. “Wait. What do you mean ‘every day’? What’ll we do ‘every day’?”

           “You know, save the world and beat-up-slash-get-beaten-up-by bad guys,” Michael tried, but no one understood. He sighed. “C’mon, not even you, Luke? Not even the supposed ‘smart one’?” He sighed when Luke shrugged. “Duh. We become superheroes!”

           “Whoa, who said what now?!” Ashton gaped. “What? Why?!”

           “We become superheroes,” Michael said again, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “You know, use our random and newfound superpowers to save the world and all that awesome crap.”

           “No,” Calum, Ashton, and Luke chorused. They accusingly half-glared at each other.

           “How the hell did that happen?” Michael muttered to himself. He quickly shook it off, however. “Come on, guys!” he whined. “We can wear cool outfits and everything! I even have costumes we could wear. All we have to do is save a few lives, everyone’ll love us!”

           But his idea didn’t get a good reception among the other boys.

           “Come on, you’ve gotta at least try it,” Michael tried once more, only to be just as unsuccessful as he was the first time. Upon getting yet another chorus of “no way”s, he simply muttered a, “Fine. I’ll be Spiderman all by myself.”

           Michael stomped off, probably to go make sure that the costume even still fit.

           Calum, Luke, and Ashton looked at each other.

           “You know that he will get himself killed,” Luke muttered, mildly annoyed and mildly endearing. “He is an idiot.”

           Calum sighed. “Is there even an actual choice here?”

           Ashton shrugged and shook his head. “I don’t know you guys very well, but from what I’ve seen, no, we don’t.”

The three boys stood up, preparing to follow Michael into whatever dark corner of the house he had disappeared to.

           Ashton stretched. “Well,” he said resignedly, “let’s just get this over with.”

**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

 

           Fifteen minutes later, Ashton was singing a different tune.

           “Why am I Robin?” he asked Luke, irritated. “I just don’t get it! I’m older and taller!”

           “Yes; however, I am the one with the intelligence here,” Luke calmly replied. “I mean, I am the one with the intelligence powers, at least,” he quickly amended before Ashton could even open his mouth to protest.

           Just then, Calum awkwardly stepped out of the upstairs bathroom. “I don’t like being Captain America,” he loudly complained. “First of all, we’re in Australia. Second of all, aren’t the old flags of the nations all banned, so how the hell did you even get this thing?” He tugged on the collar. “Besides, I like green better. Preferably lime green. And maybe yellow. Don’t you have, like, a Hulk costume or something?” He paused, then added, “Oh, and by the way, my ass is bruised.”

           “I. Said. I. Was. Sorry!” Robin retorted sharply.

           “Peace, my brothers, peace,” Batman interjected, suddenly sounding suspiciously British.

           “What?”

           Luke blinked, snapping out of it. “Dammit, I am speaking Shakespearean again.” He frowned. “To put it simply, shut up.”

           “Everyone, stop it!” Spiderman interrupted, having randomly appeared from out of nowhere. “So whaddaya think?” He puffed out his chest proudly. “We’re superheroes!”

           “Yeah. So?” Ashton wanted to know.

           Luke held up a finger in objection. “Although technically we are superhumans, not superheroes at the moment—”

           “SO,” Michael cut off his mate. “We go do superhero stuff, not fight over stupid stuff like this!”

           “‘Superhero stuff’?” Luke questioned dryly. These days, he seemed to have two different sides: Shakespeare-Luke and Sarcastic-Luke. “Such as what, exactly?”

           “Like, oh, I dunno…get cats out of trees and…help old ladies cross roads.”

           Calum puffed out his cheeks, resembling a blowfish—that was, assuming any blowfish would ever feel the need to wear a Captain America costume. “Bo-ring. What about busting drug dealers or saving hostages from bank robbers or stopping art thieves or busting smuggling rings? Those’re things that real superheroes do, right?”

           “I’m allergic to cats,” Ashton randomly pointed out, but no one really paid him any attention.

           “Suck it up,” Spidey said sternly. “Now, let’s go out and SAVE THE WORLD.”

           “Uh, yeah, no. Not today,” Ashton objected abruptly. “I have a test to study for.”

           “I have homework as well,” Luke added. He frowned. “Although it is not like it will be difficult for me to finish it anymore.”

           “And I have to give my ass time to heal,” Calum spoke up. He looked at Michael, patting his friend on the shoulder. “I’m sorry, mate. It’s just that stuff like this takes time.”

           Michael frowned, his excitement and eagerness deflating like a popped balloon, but nodded reluctantly. “I guess…fine. We do have school tomorrow. And it is kinda sudden.”

           Ashton sighed in relief. “So we can change back?”

           “…I guess,” Michael mumbled.

           Ashton cheered silently.

           “Also, do you have any ice?” Calum wanted to know.

           Wordlessly, Michael pointed him towards the kitchen.

           Calum turned and headed for the kitchen.

         Michael’s eyes flashed red as he unintentionally used his power. “Wow, man. Your butt really is bruised.”

 

**[ C.A.L.M. ]**

 

           At lunch the next day, the four boys sat outside together. And since there were too many students that went to their school for anyone to really care all that much (or even notice), all they got were a couple weird looks.

           Ashton was completely silent until about halfway through lunch, while Calum, Luke, and Michael engaged in falsely cheerful small talk for awhile before falling silent.

           Suddenly, Ashton spoke up. “What’re we supposed to even do about this?” he groaned. “We can’t stop it or control it or anything.” He grimaced. “Today I tried to sharpen my pencil, and it wasn’t working, so I clenched my fists and accidentally splintered the pencil.” He trailed off into a stiff silence.

           “And I can’t walk by bathrooms anymore,” Michael took that moment to add.

           Calum burst into loud laughter. “I just can’t take your power seriously!”

           Luke, Ashton, and Michael stared blankly at Calum until he muttered a quick apology and shut up.

           “And my teachers think that I am cheating or something of the sort,” Luke added. “I was called into the principal’s office and questioned about it this morning, actually.”

           “Hmm.” Michael frowned. “Luke, yours is an easy fix. Just act dumb and get stuff purposely wrong sometimes.”

           “Incorrect,” Luke corrected. “‘Wrong’ implies that it has to deal with morals.”

           Michael groaned. He had been interested the first time Luke had told him that, but by now, the millionth time, he really didn’t care. “Maybe that’ll be harder than expected.”

           “Hey, what about me?” Calum questioned through a mouthful of sandwich.

           “Yours is even easier.” Michael paused to take a sip of his soda and to tear a large chunk out of his slice of his pepperoni pizza with his teeth. “You can just not talk to animals around other people.”

           “And me?” Ashton dared ask. He speared some lettuce with his fork, but must have done so a bit too hard, because the plastic fork snapped in two. One of the broken ends dug into his fist, and he winced slightly.

           “Just make a conscious effort to be less strong,” Michael decided. “And as for me…well, I dunno.” He bit into his pizza again, eating it at an almost inhuman rate (no, that was not another power he had suddenly gained. he had always been able to do that).

           “Would sunglasses work?” Calum suggested. “They did for that guy in X-Men.”

           “He had laser vision, smart one,” Luke interjected snarkily. “Also, they were specially made, if I recall correctly.”

           “Hey, you never know.” Calum shrugged, standing to go throw away his trash. “And you’re the smart one.”

           “I am going to use the restroom,” announced Luke, so he got up and walked away, too.

           “Well, I’m gonna go buy another piece of pizza. Michael wants another slice!” Said teen snickered, using third person point of view, for whatever reason. “And maybe some cake…,” he mused as he made his way back inside and to the lunch-line.

           Ashton, left on his own, sighed and leaned back on the bench. He put his arms underneath his head and closed his eyes, allowing himself to relax for the first time all day.

           After a few seconds, Ashton heard something rustling in front of him. “You back, Calum?” he asked without opening his eyes.

           There was no response.

           Ashton frowned, sitting up properly, putting his arms back down at his side, and opening his eyes again.

           The person—or rather, people—in front of him were not Calum or even Luke or Michael. In fact, they weren’t even students at the school.

           “Mr. Ashton Irwin, correct?” asked the first of the three men in black suits and dark sunglasses.

           “Y…yes?” Ashton stuttered, worried, but it came out more as a question than as a confirmation.

           The second guy stepped forward.

“We’re going to have to ask you to come with us.” **  
**


End file.
